He Came From Outer Space
by Sidhbh
Summary: A meteor falls down to the OZ, bringing fear and danger with it. Crossover Tin Man/Star Trek: First Contact.
1. He Came From Outer Space

"Three moons," DG mumbled.

Wyatt was heading for a decent snooze when DG's voice woke him up. Not that he'd admit that. "What?"

"Two suns, three moons," DG repeated, louder.

"Oh. Yeah, we're a little greedy in the O.Z." Wyatt smiled at her.

DG smiled back. "Good book?"

"Oh, yeah! 'Etiquette of Eastern Guild'."

"The Eastern Guild has etiquette?" They certainly weren't very polite to me or Glitch, DG thought.

"Apparently, though I can't make it past page five."

"Wow! Look, Cain!" She pointed to night's sky, where meteors were falling from the sky. Really big meteors. Not big! Near! They saw it crash into the ground. "Wow!"

"Uh, I think 'yikes' is a better word, Princess."

"I've always wanted to see a meteor up close!"

"You're just making that up!" Wyatt protested. DG laughed. "No, no, you're doing this to annoy me, aren't you?"

"You're paranoid."

"Paranoid. Yeah, but it keeps happening. You're actually a devious mastermind, I'm on to you."

DG smiled at him. "You and I both know I'm going."

Wyatt hissed, looking back out at the landing-site. "It's in the plains, so an ambush is unlikely... fine. But! First sign of trouble... you do what I say when I say it!"

DG saluted dutifully.

Glitch was delighted with the find. Turns out shards of metal formed most of it. Most of it. He freaked when he found himself in possession of dismembered arm. "You ok, Ambrose?" Cain asked.

"Guess there were people in there," Glitch replied, sickened.

"Aliens?" DG was excited. "Oh." Excitement wasn't exactly called for.

Wyatt waded through the wrecked pieces himself, looking from one piece to another, but not in any great detail. His head was too filled with other thoughts. In a way, these bits of rubbish from the night's sky represent so much more - people? What were they like? Will they help us or harm us? The overall feeling he got gave him shivers.

Something stood out. A white human form. "Guys," he pointed. "Maybe we can find out what these guys look like."

They wandered over to the form, some kind of space suit, Wyatt figures. The first thing he noticed, besides the fact that he somehow feels better about the design of the thing, is the smoke damage in the centre of the suit. He was shot. The next he noticed, sends a chill through him. It's him.

Ok, it's not. For one, he had brown hair, not blond and he's stockier, just slightly. And another - there was metal shooting through the skin, as if it was welded to him. The guy's skin is an ashen grey. But aside from the burn, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with the suit.

"Ok, did he just move?!" DG asked, half-panicked, confirming what Cain had seen.

"Yeah," Glitch was also freaked and who could blame him. The man fell from the sky and was still alive. That was some trick.

"Come on," Cain decided. "Let's get him back to the palace."

"Wait, Cain! Maybe his back's broken. Should we move him?"

Cain sighed, already unsettled. "I don't suppose you could use your magic to see if he's all right?"

"I'm more of a nature-girl, trees and things." She reached out anyway. And was immediately thrown back. "Ok. I can't do that."

Cain was at her side. "I'm sorry, darlin'! Are you all right?"

DG shivered. "Yeah... his back's not broken. Somehow. Geez, Cain, I don't know what that was but it gave me the shivers!"

Cain hugged her. "Sorry about that."

"I'll get a stretcher," Glitch volunteered.

"Cain, that looks like..."

"Yeah," Cain interrupted, his tone saying that he didn't want it even mentioned. DG understood and let it go.

"Maybe he's a spy," Cain suggested.

"A spy?" Jeb asked him after the long silence that followed. "You mean a doppelganger sent on an evil scheme to replace you?"

Cain shrugged, admittedly insecure. "Yeah."

Jeb crossed his arms. "He's got brown hair, Dad."

"You can colour that."

"And what is he going to do with that big metal welded into his face?"

"More than just his face. All across his body," the medic, Daniels, reported. "Near as I could tell it had to have been put on him before he put on that suit. Though I can't imagine why."

"Too many questions," Cain decided. "We should ask him a few."

"No." Surprisingly that objection didn't come from Daniels but Raw. "No go near man. Dangerous. Hold him with magic."

"What...?" Cain was about to ask him why.

"NOW! Danger!" Raw was panicked.

Cain just nodded once and went to fetch DG.


	2. Resistance

"I don't understand," DG argued again, even while doing as requested by Cain and begged by Raw. "All he's done is get hurt and you want to lock him up?"

"Wants it," Raw repeated, anxious for DG to complete her work.

"He wants it?" DG asked again.

Raw nodded. "Terrified. Of what he does. In pain. Great pain. Great suffering. Is screaming."

"Ok, it's up," DG stepped back. Raw nodded gratefully, but didn't seem able to relax, probably still reading the patient. "But I don't get it. You're not even touching him. He's unconscious. How do you know?"

"Powerful emotion. Beyond what Raw knows. Beyond what all know. Raw never sense pain like this."

"I wonder who he is," DG whispered.

Apparently, he was anxious to introduce himself as he jerked again. His eyes opened, as distinctive as Cain's own. But he stared blankly up. After a few seconds he sat up, keeping his back stiff. He moved his head, his eyes landing on each person in the room in turn, but not actually looking at anyone. It was eerie as all hell.

"Why is he doing that?" DG asked, a tremor in her voice.

"Isn't doing that," Raw replied. "Something else. Emotionless."

"What do you mean?"

"Man scared. Won't come out. Possessed maybe."

"Possessed?" Cain repeated.

By this time, the man had gotten awkwardly out of bed. He honed in on Cain, staring at him, but not acknowledging that he was there. "Species: human," he said.

"Uh... yeah," Cain replied.

"You will be assimilated."

"Ok... uh... what does that mean?"

"You will be Borg."

"Is that... is that what you are?" Glitch asked. "Borg?"

"We are Borg," he replied. "You will be assimilated." He stepped forward into the magic shield. It sent him reeling back. He registered no pain. "Resistance is futile." He tried again. Then he stepped forward but remained within the shield.

"My name is DG. I'm a princess." The Borg ignored her. "What's your name?"

"This drone was not assigned a designation. You will be assimilated."

"Why were you 'not assigned a designation'?"

"This drone was assimilated but was not assigned a unimatrix."

"What was your name before you were assimilated?"

"Names are irrelevant."

"But if you don't have a designation, then you have to have a name."

The Borg stopped his examination of the shield. "This drone's name was... Lieutenant Séan Thomas Hawk."

That was a damned human sounding name. "Hi, Séan, I'm Wyatt. This is Ambrose and that's Raw."

Séan stepped, well, 'stomped' is probably a better word over as close as he could to the Viewer. "Identify species."

"He's a Viewer," Cain told him.

"Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own." Raw backed away. "Resistance is futile."

"Who's 'we'?" Jeb asked.

Séan stared at him. "We are Borg."

"But there's only one of you."

"We are Borg."

"You're alone."

"Alone." Cain nearly jumped at the sudden emotion that was in that single word. There was something alive in there. The Borg was that guy's Tin Suit. "One voice among many. Alone."

"Séan. We're here to help you," Cain tried to talk to him.

"We are Borg," he repeated, though this time, one of his eyes was watering.

"My sister was possessed by a witch," DG told him. "She was trapped inside her own body, unable to move, unable to breath on her own. She hurt a lot of people but that was the Witch, it wasn't her."

The Borg stepped away from the shield and faced the wall. DG looked to Raw, who nodded. He suddenly doubled over and was gasping. He grabbed at the nearby bed, his fingers clenching them into his hands. And he let out this plaintive cry that was agony to hear. "Oh, God!" he was sobbing. "Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God..."

In a fit of compassion that nearly gave Cain a heart attack, DG brushed aside the shield and went to Séan's side. She hugged him. "It's ok, we'll get through this, and you're not alone..." Cain went to the other side, half to get an early warning if the Borg decided to show.

Séan calmed himself, pushing his tears out of his face with his sleeve, his hand catching on the implants. He wanted to pull them out of his face but Cain stilled his hand. Séan growled. "They're welded onto your face pretty bad," Cain warned.

Séan gave a humourless laugh. "They've not been welded, they grew."

"Grew?" Ambrose asked.

"Borg nanoprobes. They act as viruses, attacking the bloodstream, taking over the function of your red blood cells. They replicate too fast for your body to combat it and the next thing you know... you look like this. Linked to the hive mind and killing your friends, people you respect, you love... or worse... doing this to them and the cycle begins again."

"That's why you kept saying 'we'."

"Voices all at once saying the same thing. Hundreds of them." He was silent. How the hell did the captain survive that? "No wonder I've a damned headache." It was weak, even his tone, but he got points for trying.

"Tell us about yourself, Séan," DG asked. Séan gave her such a look of disbelief that she had to smile. "You're obviously not from around here."

Comprehension dawned. "Oh." The prime directive. Or is that the temporal prime directive? "Well, I... I'm a Capricorn?"

DG laughed. "We know you came from space, we saw you crash," she pointed out.

"Didn't expect you to be human though," Jeb remarked. "And what's a Capricorn?"

"Zodiac, Jeb," DG explained. "It's not important."

"Are you from the Other Side?" Glitch asked.

"The... Other Side?" Séan repeated.

"Earth," DG explained. "Um... see... we're kinda in a different dimension."

Séan absorbed that. "Shit," he said. "That does explain those two," he pointed at Raw and Glitch.

"Hey, they put my brain back!" Glitch went possessively to his head.

"Back? Wouldn't that make you dead?" Séan looked over at him in fascination.

"Obviously not!"

"I beg your pardon," Séan apologised.

"It's ok," Cain assured him. "But we'd still like to know who you are and how you come to be in our dimension."

"Well, uh, I'm a Starfleet officer," Séan began.

"You can trust us," DG urged.

"It's not that," Hawk replied. "It's... we have a rule, The Prime Directive, it governs how we act with different cultures. We're not to interfere."

"Well, that's great, but I don't see what that has to do with this."

"It includes technology and history and I have to be careful what I say."

"History? You're from the future?" DG asked. Hawk was silent. "If I promise not to go back to Earth?" He gave her a look. "Right."

"Is there any security concerns that you think I ought to be aware of?" Cain asked him.

Hawk looked at himself. "Me," he said seriously. "Was there anything found with me?"

"A few bits and pieces... debris, nothing interesting."

"I'd like to take a look, if that's all right?"

"You sure you up to it?"

"I'm not going to sleep." It was obvious that the idea terrified him.

"Can't stay awake forever," Wyatt reminded him gently.

Hawk just nodded, pulling himself up.


	3. Cybernetic Ghosts

DG watched Hawk wandered through the debris, almost as if it was some kind of graveyard. He was obviously tired, but it's just as obvious that he'll be stubborn about rest. He picked something up, looking it over, frowning.

Then he looked up at the roof. Or rather through the roof. A maid appeared beside her. Taking the tea, DG went over to him. "Hi."

"Hi," he replied, somewhat automatically. He snapped out of it and gave her a lob-sided smile.

"For you," she told him.

"Oh, uh... thanks," he took the tea, readjusting the object in his hand.

"Find anything?"

"What year is it on the 'Other Side'? Do you know?"

"2006."

Séan closed his eyes briefly. "Thank you."

"You didn't answer my question."

"I... I was just trying to figure out how I got here. One minute I'm in one year, one dimension, the next..."

"What year?"

Hawk hesitated. "2063."

"Sixty years. Almost. I wonder what'll happen in that time."

"A lot. But I'm not much of an historian." Which probably got him into this mess in the first place. If he had a particular interest in the time, the Captain would have known about it and he'd have gone planetside. Shirking your duties, Lieutenant?

What are my duties? You're a Starfleet officer. "Yes."

"What?"

"Oh! Uh... thinking to myself."

"You should get some rest." Hawk shook his head, his attention back on the thing he was carrying. "What is that?"

"It's a data node."

"Can you access it?"

Hawk didn't answer, merely walked slowly to the nearest service. "I... I think so," he whispered, almost so that DG missed it. He made a fist and pointed it near the node. Two grey straw-like things burst out of his hand and dropped into the device. DG stared. The device started to make whirring sounds before Hawk jerked his hand slightly. The things retreated back into his hand.

"What the hell was that?"

"Assimilation tubules," Hawk replied. "It's how the Borg assimilate victims into the collective. It sends the nanoprobes to where they're needed. In this case, they gather information. In others, they make me. There's no known defence against them."

"Did you get any answers from that thing?" DG asked, eyeing the offending hand and making sure it faced away from her.

"A few."

DG sighed. "I can't help you if you don't talk to me. What's the last thing you remember?"

"I was... The Borg had taken over my ship. But they just stopped. The captain told us that they were going to try to contact their people in their own time. Which would have meant Earth's assimilation. They were building their device onto the hull, so the captain, another officer and I went outside to stop them. There were three clamps, one for each of us. They ignored us at first. That's what Borg do.

"Then they realised what we were doing. They sent drones after each of use. We fired, killing them. All I had to do was turn the valve, but another Borg was sent after me, they had adapted to our weapons, and by the time the captain's call registered, it was too late. The thing picked me up and away...

"It went through my suit like there was nothing there," he raised his assimilation hand. "It... hurt." He was silent. "Then Worf shot me. It's a peculiar experience, celebrating your death... I floated away, the Earth beneath me. I don't know how long it took... but suddenly there was this scream, more like a screech and I blacked out and then... and then..."

"And then?" DG prompted.

"Well, that's the point, isn't it! I don't know! Next thing, I'm with you."

"That... thing not tell you anything?"

"Precious little. A damn manifest. Some trace readings. It's badly damaged. Hints and whispers..." He looked across the debris. Useful for a Borg ship, sure, but not much good for him. He froze. He heard a sudden upsurge of whispers in his head, sick and inhuman.

"Are you ok?"

"Ok? Ok is whole different dimension," he looked at her, terrified. "They're alive!"

"The Borg?"

He nodded, moving off. "We have to stop them."

"Hold on!"

"NO!" The man was terrified, near tears. He looked like Cain, but he sure didn't act like the level-headed man. Of course, DG wasn't seeing him at his best, not by a long shot. "We can't give the advantage! THEY'LL ASSIMILATE US ALL!"

"Hey, now," Cain approached, fearing for DG's safety, despite the fact that all Hawk had done was rip his sleeve from her grasp. "What's all the fuss?"

"The Borg are here, in the O.Z," DG explained.  
"I thought you said they were from a different dimension," Cain asked.

"That is from a different dimension! How long did it take you to get the debris field?"

"The next morning," DG admitted. "We didn't know it was dangerous!"

"It's not!" Cain retorted.

"The drones are!"

Cain growled and looked over at the debris. "What drones?"

"From the sphere," Hawk replied, still hearing the voices. He tried to make them out, but could only catch snippets, bits of code that almost made sense. "We destroyed it, but maybe a few drones escaped..."

"How big is the sphere?"

"About five times the size of this palace," Hawk replied, aware that random numbers didn't have quite the effect that comparisons did. "Thousands of drones."

"But I don't see any here," Cain pointed out. "So why the sudden excitement."

"I can hear them. The hive mind."

"In your head."

Hawk hissed. "I'm not crazy," he insisted through grated teeth.

"You've been through a lot."

"Fine. Stay here."

Cain reached out for him. "You, uh, got a specific location in mind."

"They're calling for me. They want me to find them."

Cain nodded. "Let me get some men together. Ok?"

Hawk nodded.

"I'm coming too," DG volunteered.

"NO!" the pair of them responded in chorus. They glanced at each other before Hawk continued. "You're not going. I've barely been here a day and I realise how important you are to these people. You're a step away from the throne and they call you the 'light'. I can't allow you to risk your life."

"I helped depose a tyrant in the course of a week! I'm not a child!"

That thought never crossed Hawk's mind. In fact, he was only a few years older than her. He'd seen people younger working in Starfleet. "This isn't just a tyrant," he growled. "These things think committing genocide is just another day at the office! They have successfully assimilated entire worlds, entire cultures far more advanced than either of our cultures." He saw DG begin to tear up, so he calmed himself. "DG, you are the admiral. You are the one who's got to make the tough decision if we don't make it."

"What 'decision'?"

"You have to understand, DG, if we don't accomplish our mission, we'll be turned to Borg. We'll have lost our individuality, who we are. If we're lucky, we'll be killed. But the Borg cannot be allowed to assimilate this world. If we don't get back, you're to use all you have and destroy them."

DG glanced at Cain before looking back at Hawk. She was terrified. "But..."

"Don't hesitate, DG," Hawk insisted, before DG could vocalise her doubts. "Trust me. You'll be doing, Cain, and us, all a favour."

The tears fell from her eyes, but she nodded. "Understood," she replied thickly.

"I'll go, DG," Azkadellia volunteered. Funnily enough, this didn't make DG feel better. "You'll need magic," she told Hawk. "And nobody cares if I live or die, in fact, the latter is preferable. Nobody's ever going to trust me to take the throne. I'm the spare."

"I'm not going to aid your suicide, Princess," he replied.

"It's not suicide, Lieutenant Hawk," she allowed her anger show. "I was possessed, by only one, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let anything that happen to anyone else."

Hawk stared at her. "Wear pants."

"Thank you."

"Don't."

"We need to gather supplies," Cain began slowly. "It would help if I knew how long we going to be gone."

"I don't suppose you happen to have an efficient road infrastructure."

"Kinda fell by the wayside when The Sorceress took over," Jeb admitted.

"Not that it was a priority before. Environmental issues," Cain added. "We generally use horses."

"Well, it'll likely slow the Borg's progress," Hawk replied optimistically. "It's been a while since I've ridden a horse."

"I'll get the men."

"I'll be down in a minute," Hawk nodded. Cain stared at him. One minute he's rushing to get out after these Borg, the next, 'down in a minute'? "I found something of note in here, something we could use against the Borg. It's not connected, but I can do that on the way."

"Oh." He nodded, though a clueless look graced his face. "Jeb can bring you down."


	4. We Are One

"Ready?" Cain asked him.

Hawk gave him a brisk nod. "Let's get moving." Using his least damaged hand, he gently placed it on the horse indicated to him by Cain. The creature was warm under him, alive, and he smiled, stroking it slightly. "Hi, beautiful," he whispered to her. The horse seemed calm enough. She shifted slightly when Hawk mounted, but that was mostly because he couldn't quite keep the anxiety he felt under control. "Like riding a bike," he told the watching Cain.

"I'll take your word for it," he replied, glancing back at the others, Azkadellia, his son and twenty men, looked ready to go. He spurred his horse on and the group followed.

"I hope this is enough people," Jeb whispered to Hawk as he picked up his pace enough to ride alongside him.

"Almost too many," Hawk replied. "The Borg is less likely to consider us a threat immediately, the smaller our group is."

"I don't suppose you have a plan of attack."

"The beginnings of one," he replied. "I'll need more information."

"The, uh... voices aren't telling you anything?"

"It's like you're in a crowded room, you hear the sounds, but you can't tell what they're saying except for the odd shout."

"Is it going to get stronger as we approach?"

"It should."

"What's that going to do to you?"

He looked at the horse. "Let's hope the Borg aren't interested in lower life forms." The horse objected to that particular characterisation. "That's their view, not mine, sweetheart. If it makes you feel better, apparently, humans have a 'below average cranial capacity'."

"We've got small heads?"

"They're talking about processing speed - in essence, we're idiots."

"Processing speed. Right." It reminded him of The Sorceress, specifically how she used Ambrose. He stole a glance at Azkadellia, who to his surprise was looking back at him. He couldn't read her expression, so he looked away.

They kept up the fast pace, but they couldn't beat the suns set. The horses were tired, so despite Hawk's, thankfully unspoken, objection, he ordered them to stop for the night.

"What are you doing?" Azkadellia sat beside Hawk, who was fiddling with several pieces of the technology found. It had some kind of rough form to it, by this stage.

"I'm... making a scanner. It will help detect the Borg before they come close enough to uh..."

"Is it working?"

"Almost."

Azkadellia was silent for a while. "You should rest."

"No," Hawk replied, his voice was barely above a whisper.

"You haven't slept since you woke up, Hawk. Think of your immune system, if nothing else?"

That stopped him. His immune system was the only thing keeping him from... "Understood." He put the piece down and moved off to unpack his case.

Azkadellia moved up behind him, gently putting a hand on his shoulder. "Goodnight, Séan."

"Goodnight, ma'am." He hid behind the metal scarring the right side of his face. Azkadellia left him in peace.

Hawk's frenetic dreams of being stalked by Borg, assimilating his friends, even just the people near him now, were happily disrupted by the loud rustling of the underbrush. He woke and turned to the source. He tried to get up, the unexpected weight of his... the Borg components making it difficult.

By the time the source of the rustling emerged from the trees, a blond with a panicked look in his eye, he had just managed it. The man was a few metres away but already, several members of the team had intercepted him. They all aimed their guns at him. Hawk blinked. They knew what a Borg looked like. He was exhibit A, so why were they doing that to the poor man? "Zero," Cain snarled.

"What's going on?" Hawk asked, a sinking feeling that he was right in the middle of a civil war. How else could they have been ready so quickly? He cursed himself for not realising it sooner.

'Zero' looked over at him and skittered away, more terrified of Hawk than the guns. "G... get AWAY FROM ME!"

Hawk froze. He forced the sudden flood of emotion back down, which, sickeningly, was made easier by the Borg circuitry in his skull. "You've seen the Borg?" he asked. Zero could be an excellent gauge about their current strength. Given his mental state, it was obvious that he had seen the Borg descend on the people he was with, possibly even seen his friends assimilated.

"The Borg," Zero repeated. He was scared to the point of crying. He stared abruptly up at Cain. "Cain, you gotta... you gotta... save me. Throw me in the Suit again, uh, fling me in the dungeon... shoot me. Look, I don't care, just you gotta save me." He looked over at Hawk again. "I don't wanna be that, Cain. PLEASE!"

"Tell me where they are," Cain replied, his voice absent of any pity, any humanity. It may as well have been another of those voices rattling in Hawk's head. It disgusted him.

Zero flinched, possibly thinking the same thing. He shook his head. "You don't want to go there, Cain," he whispered.

"We have to," Hawk replied, not without sympathy. "Otherwise, everything you know, everything you cared about, will be lost."

"He doesn't care about anything," Jeb spat.

Hawk looked at the despised man. "He cares about individuality. You understand, if the Borg succeed, then there'll be nowhere to hide, this entire world, regardless of male or female, age or race, will be absorbed. The plants will die, replaced by machinery. And they won't even stop there." He pointed to the diminishing stars. "They'll go up and go to each of those sparkling lights and if there is a single life form around one of those lights, they'll assimilate that too. And the next and the next. Unless we stop them."

"Even the robots?" Zero asked, as if a child.

"Everything." Zero glanced back the way he came. "Anything you could tell us..."

"We were camping, about fifty clicks that way," he pointed. "The boys were celebrating another successful raid." His eyes flitted to see Cain, but what did it matter what he knew about his plans? His men had been... "Then this... thing. Blacker than you. It didn't have hands. We... just thought it was a Milltown refugee... a malfunctioning robot, supposed to look like a human. Only it was grey and ugly. We thought it was f... funny." He remembered the jeers, remembered smirking with them, his mind too much on his grand schemes to fully enjoy the moment. "Then another one popped out. With this red laser light, which was pointed at all of us. 'We are the Borg,' they said." Yeah? So? "We... didn't take much notice. 'You will be assimilated'."

"Resistance is futile," Hawk added.

Zero gave him an anguished look and nodded. "Yeah... I was kinda tired of their show so I shot one of them. Right between the eyes. It collapsed like a ton of bricks. Meyers walked over to it, made some kinda joke and laughed his head off. He was too close to another guy.

"The thing grabbed him and these things came out his hand. He just dropped him. I asked them what the hell they were doing. They just said that 'You will be assimilated' again.

"They grabbed Cohen before we could react and we started shooting. The first guy, the guy I shot, he got up again. Then Meyers got up, only he wasn't Meyers." He looked at Hawk, or more precisely, his marred face, and shuddered. "He was them. After that... don't know how I got out of there."

"Look, I realise it's difficult," Hawk indicated his face. "But we're going to need you to guide us to your camp."

"No," he pleaded.

"Zero," Hawk interrupted before the man could go further. "The difference between being an individual and a drone in the collective could be in your hands."

"Yeah, appeal to his conscience," Cain muttered. "That'll work."

Zero stiffened at his remark, becoming angry. Despite it not in keeping with the Federation's and Starfleet's beliefs that was instilled in him as a child, that was the best Hawk could hope for. "Your men, Zero, are... going through unspeakable torment even as we speak, wouldn't you...?" he trails off, Francis Drake's words entering into his head. Revenge is a wild kind of justice. The more man's nature runs to it, the more the law ought to weed it out. Francis Drake never met the Borg.

Zero grabbed Hawk's offered hand, and Hawk pulled him up easily. The other man's eyes were cold when he spoke. "Let's go."

Hawk looked over at Cain, a silent 'all right with you?' But having nothing to do about whether or not he's going. Cain gave him a dubious nod, before turning to the others. "Let's get moving!"

Zero was irked by having to wait, now itching to get some payback. He looked over at Hawk. "How come you look like him as them?"

"Fluke. And I was assimilated, but my connection to the Hive Mind was severed."

"How'd that happen?"

"The Queen died and I was far enough away that I didn't."

"The Queen?"

"The centre of the Hive Mind. Like the brain to your limbs."

"And the limbs are people."

"Drones. They have no mind of their own."

"You do."

"I was just..." he gave a humourless laugh. "Lucky. I was shot before I could do any damage."

"You one of the originals?" Hawk looked at him. Zero pointed up. "From space. You from another planet?"

"Yes. And I'm from the Other Side." That's what they call it, isn't?

"So you know all about these... Borg."

"They've committed genocide on a planetary scale, on multiple occasions. They're everything the Federation... my government stands against. The loss of individuality, of freedom of expression, of hope of a lasting peace in the galaxy and not one that is enforced by a hive mind."

"That's a... lofty goal you got there, Fed."

"You ever try reaching for something like that?"

"Me? Only one thing I'm good at, Fed, that's killing. That's why..." he waved at the group, who were obviously uncomfortable with him there. "I enjoy my work. And, uh... I achieve my goals."

"Maybe, but you have no idea how good it feels when even one new species offers their hand to you in friendship when you give them a little faith," Hawk warmed to the subject, a million light years from Borg thoughts. "The possibilities, about what they'll teach you, and you them, are virtually endless."

"That happen often? The hand thing?"

"Ok, occasionally we get shot at. But more often than not, we... wear them down." Zero laughed. "Even now, even if I die at that hands of the Borg... or worse," his voice choked the word 'worse'. "If you ask me now, do I regret joining Starfleet, I'd have to tell you no. No, I don't. Even though the people I care about think I'm dead, I don't regret a single thing. Can you say that?"

Zero looked away. "No." Hawk knew he was lying. He was angry. At what, Hawk couldn't tell, but anger is often a symptom of regret.

"Let's go," Cain brushed passed them, despite Zero being the one who was to show them where to go. Zero glared at him before speeding past Cain.

Azkadellia arrived by his side. "He killed Cain's wife, Jeb's mother. Snapped her neck. Before that, he beat and tortured Cain and his family. He had family taken away from him. Each was told the other was dead. Zero put Cain into the Suit and set up a... hologram of the abuse to be replayed over and over. He was high ranking member of the Sorceress' Army, the Longcoats."

Hawk nodded. "I see." He wondered if Cain could handle being in close quarters with Zero. Or indeed Jeb. "Something to watch out for." Azkadellia gave him a surprised look, but he couldn't tell why.


	5. From One Royal To Another

When they arrived at the camp, all that was left was a few battered tents and everything was trampled as if a herd of elephants had stampeded through. But there was no sign of the Borg.

"Doesn't look like anybody else survived," Jeb remarked.

"M... maybe they ran off. Those things aren't really all that fast."

Cain snorted at Zero's remark. "Perhaps," Hawk replied seriously. He was looking at the tracks, coming from various directions. Obviously due to their chasing the Longcoats.

"Looks like they came from that direction."

"They just walked in," Zero agreed.

"Where's the nearest look out point?" Hawk asked Zero, walking that direction. Zero pointed up a tree. Hawk shimmied up it and looked through his binoculars, his scanner on his lap. "I got them."

"What... what are they doing?"

"Building." Hawk frowned and switched the binoculars with his scanner. He worked out it.

Jeb got impatient and climbed up beside him, using his own binoculars. "I know what that is..." he frowned.

Hawk looked at him. "Jeb?"

Jeb shook his head. "I dunno..."

"What does your device tell you?" Azkadellia asked.

"Some kind of weather machine," he replied, sounding bewildered. "The ideal temperature for Borg is a good deal warmer and humid than this but... it doesn't seem an efficient use of their time."

"The Borg equal efficiency..." Zero murmured, to himself, looking around at the battered tents.

"Weather machine... wind machine," Cain realised.

Hawk shrugged. "Wind, humidity..."

"Wind as in tornados."

"Tornadoes," Azkadellia repeated. Jeb joined in.

"Hi!" Hawk waved. "Out-of-towner here. I could use a translation."

"We travel from here to the Other Side using what we call a Travel Storm."

Hawk gave a bitter laugh. "The sons of a bitches are finishing the job," he growled. He jumped out of the tree. "Let's get moving."

"What? We're.. we're just going to walk in there?" Zero demanded.

"That's exactly what we're doing."

"That's suicide."

"They'll ignore us until they consider a threat."

"Oh and what'll that take?"

"Shooting them. And blowing them up."

"We could walk in and they'll just ignore us?"

"Stay here if you want." Hawk moved off.

Zero growled but followed him. "If he dies, don't expect me to rescue him," Cain whispered to Azkadellia.

"We should catch up," she said, moving to do so.

Hawk would be lying if he said he didn't feel absolutely petrified at approaching the... Travel Storm generator. Like a perverted tree, with black ants working around and inside, throbbing with sick energy. But that's good, he told himself. That's what makes you 'you' and not 'them'. Feelings, emotions. Fear.

"You really sure?" Zero asked him, making sure Hawk was between him and those things. Hawk didn't respond, looking behind instead, to see if the others were following.

When they caught up with them, he nodded at Cain's trepidation. "Trust me." Cain gave him a dubious look but finally nodded. "I suggest only a small group go in, in case..."

"You're going in," he told Zero in no uncertain terms.

"I was planning to," he growled back. Well, he is now.

Hawk put a stilling hand on him. "We go in, do a little recon and come out. Let's not do anything aggressive, ok?"

"Zero, if you get us..."

"Then you'll truly understand each other," Hawk cut in. "When your thoughts are one." Without giving either a chance to retort, he surged on inside. Zero waved the others on ahead. Well, until Cain glared at him and shoved him forward.

The first thing Cain noticed was the heat. Humid too. He immediately started to sweat. The Witch's Tower was hot too but Cain figured that had something to do with steam and it didn't look like that how things were done here. The sounds of the place were different, much eerier than the Tower.

The décor didn't help. It was this sickly green against metallic black and as they got deeper, he started seeing drones lining the corridors. They just stood there, their eyes shut. Of course, the ones who were moving didn't soothe him any.

Occasionally, one of them would look at them, his eyes wide but empty, but then just push past them and continue walking down the corridor. They froze when they started to hear the screams.

"No anaesthetic," Hawk explained, though his voice was thick with emotion.

"We have to help them," Azkadellia whispered.

"We can't. I doubt it's escaped your notice how outnumbered we are, Highness," Hawk replied. "They'll swarm on us if we interfere."

"There must be something we can do."

"Kill them quick," Zero suggested.

"That may be the only choice we'll have," Hawk admitted.

Azkadellia didn't like to hear that, but she remained silent, preferring to think. There had to be a way. If the Witch taught her anything, it was careful planning would pay off. If it hadn't been for DG, her distraction, even Cain and the others would have been just a minor inconvenience. "We need to see the Queen," she decided.

That caused Hawk stop. He stared at her for a few moments. "She was killed..." He heard the scream as she died, didn't he?

"You don't sound too sure."

"I'm thinking in three dimensional terms..." he murmured.

"Yeah! I hate when I do that!" Zero remarked.

"Shut up," Cain told him. He approached Hawk, who looked at him. "You said you could hear them. All the voices."

Hawk shook his head. "Too many. Too strong. I can't hear what they're saying."

"Stop. Stop figuring out what they're saying - it doesn't matter."

"Of course, it matters..."

"Doesn't matter, ok? Doesn't matter. Hear the sounds they make. Who's in charge?"

"Who's in charge..."

"Concentrate, Séan. Hear the sounds."

Hawk shut his eyes. "She's alive," he sounded sick.

"Where?"

"That way," he pointed. "Hold on. Wandering about here is bad enough, but, if you head for the Queen, they'll consider that alone to be a hostile act."

"And then our thoughts will be one," Zero said.

"I'm not looking forward to that," Jeb admitted.

"I can mask us," Azkadellia volunteered.

"They'd be able to detect the energy," Hawk shook his head.

"I was thinking about that," Azkadellia agreed. "And I've been reaching out to see what energy they use. I think I can match it."

"We should test your theory. Mask yourself and I'll see if I can see you."

"All right."

She disappeared from his view. Hawk picked up his scanner and smiled. "Looks like this could work."

"Excellent," she said. He could see her again, she was smiling. "Ready when you are."

"Proceed," he replied. "Though we'd have to be quiet."

Things seemed safer under Azkadellia's spell. Though every time Zero worked his way into the middle, closer to Azkadellia, one or other of the Cains pulled him out. If Azkadellia was to falter, they had no qualms about having him be the first victim.

"Unimatrix One," Hawk whispered, when they finally arrived at a door.

"Where the Queen lives?" Jeb asked.

"Uh... how do we get in?" Zero asked. "Won't they notice the door opening?"

"They will." They looked around them. At least three drones were close by, and there were plenty more where that came from. "I'll have to be quick."

"And our aim will have to be sure," Cain nodded. "Princess, keep your shield up. We could use all help we can get." Jeb and the two others raised their weapons. Zero moved back in the group, weapon less. Cain nodded at Hawk, who went to a panel and used his tubules on it.

The effect wasn't immediate, several tense seconds passed before the door opened. The reaction to that was immediate. Drones popped out from all directions, including up. The area filled with bright flashes and loud bangs. They retreated into the chamber.

Once inside the doors, the attack stopped. No more drones came forward and the guns went silent. Nobody moved. Nobody spoke.

"I know you're there," a feminine voice spoke, amused. At Cain's nod, Azkadellia dropped the shield. "Nice to see you."

Cain was the first to speak. "Why, uh, don't you return the favour?"

A soft hiss was his response. They looked up to the roof and saw black pipes snake across and as one slipped into a hole in the roof. While this was happening some kind of suit emerged. As the pipes reappeared, it became apparent that it wasn't a suit.

"I'm going to be sick..." Zero remarked as her spine wiggled beneath her. The head and shoulders was placed into the waiting body. Really sharp looking hooks dug right into the skin of her shoulders as she settled inside. "Oh, Gods!"

"Is there a problem, Zero?" she purred, approaching him.

He stepped back. "Nope. No problem."

"I can remove that human vanity, if you like," she insisted.

"I like my vanity," he murmured, his head down.

"Stop!" Azkadellia ordered.

The Queen's alien eyes flashed as she looked at her. "From one queen to another? What brings you here? Aside from bringing my family home," she gave Hawk a warm smile.

"You are not my family," Hawk snarled, raising his weapon. The Queen barely moved but a host of drones converged on them.

"Hey, there buddy!" Zero's voice was high with fear. "Let's not put the gun at the nice lady!"

"Shut up, Zero," Cain growled.

"I don't want to be killed."

"We're here," Azkadellia interrupted. "Because we're going to stop you."

"Stop me? My drones number in the hundreds and are growing," she replied, which made them think of those left outside. Were they ok?

"You heard me." Though in truth, she had no real idea about how she was going to win. But she was getting angry.

The Queen just smirked at her before returning her attention to Hawk. His hand went up to his head and he screamed. "NO!" He collapsed to the floor. He shook his head, trying to shake her off. "My name... is Séan Thomas Hawk, Lieutenant, serial number... Ah! Starfleet..." The others, aside from Zero, tried to get to him. The drones stood impassively in their way. "Parents names: Luanne and..."

"Damien," the Queen finished. "Born in the Vegas colony 2348..." By now, Hawk was whispering in tune.

"NO!" That was Azkadellia. "Not again," she murmured, her eyes snapping shut. A light shone and everyone screamed.

Eventually, the blinding light faded. There was a lot of murmuring while sight returned slowly. Even through the lingering shade of green cast over everything, Cain gasped at what he saw.

The Borg were gone. Now they were surrounded by people, not an ounce circuitry between them. There was a mask on the floor. Only it wasn't a mask. It was the skin covering the Borg Queen's face.

Azkadellia! The girl herself was collapsed on the ground, cradled by a restored Hawk, who was in tears over her body. Cain moved to join them and checked for a pulse. She was alive, barely.


	6. Epilogue

The first thing Azkadellia felt was the frankly ridiculously sharp pain stabbing itself through her brain. The second was the softness of the skin against her hand. "Azkadellia," an equally soft (thank Glinda) voice spoke up. "You're awake."

The hand moved up to her forward. "Forgive me, Mother," Azkadellia whispered back. "But I'm not opening my eyes."

"Understandable, my darling," she replied with amusement. "That was some magic you cast. Mr Cain and the others were very concerned."

At the mention of Mr Cain, Azkadellia opened her eyes. She wavered for a moment before turning to her mother. "Mr Hawk! She was… he was…"

The Queen wrapped her arms around her daughter to calm. "It's all right, my darling! Hawk is fine along with the other former drones. Fine and grateful. You saved them all."

"I…"

The Queen glowed with pride. "Saved them all. Shall I get Mr Hawk, so you can see?"

Azkadellia stared at her mother for a few moments before nodding.

When Hawk arrived, he seemed awkward and nervous. "My Gods! You look like Cain now!" she laughed.

He smiled too. "Yeah, apparently, I'm forbidden to wear a hat."

"I'm so glad you're ok!"

Hawk looked incredulous. "I'm ok? The fan club and I were worried about you!"

"F…fan club?"

"About a hundred so people and growing, actually. You saved so many lives, Princess, the entire O.Z., in fact, you didn't think people would be grateful?"  
"I… guess I never thought about it."

"Well, you only got up," he shrugged. "But if I may be so corny, today is the first day of the rest of your life."

"What about yours?"

"I'm going to try to make it home to my time," he told her. "I have family there - I don't want them hurt. A few of the others want to come with me - I'll even take Zero off your hands, if you want."

"I don't know if Zero will be welcome," Azkadellia replied.

"Anyone's welcome," he told her. "We believe it's an illness he's suffering and with a little time, he could be a contributing member of society again. And best of all, nobody will remember what he did. He can start over."

Azkadellia was silent, her feelings a mixture of regret, envy and guilt. "He was my right hand man for only a week."

"A member of the toughest part of your army for much longer than that," he reminded her. "It's… not out of the realms of reality for you to be able to see him again. From what I can figure - time relative to our dimensions is, according to that sister of yours, 'screwy'."

"It'll take a while for you to get it all together?"

"We've a few bright sparks, but yeah."

"Hate to sound selfish - but good."

He smiled.


End file.
